Existential Thoughts

The shimmering light rising from the east belies a furtive darkness creeping over the land. Where once stood oxygen-producing, pristine rain forest, we see its erosion to ranching, cattle, and other artifacts of modernity.

The planet heats up at an unprecedented rate, yet the collective human intelligence appears unable to transcend the greed of exploitation.

Transpiring concurrently, is the deterioration of civil discourse and critical thinking, made perfectly acceptable by the anonymity of social media. One dimensional thought, sloganeering, laced with malevolent and sophomoric statements, is sucking the vibrancy from Socratic ways of discourse. This breakdown is spreading as rapidly as the ancient glaciers are shrinking.

Narcissism is seen as attractive and humility as a sign of weakness. Nihilism, in some places, is clothed as somehow religious.

The picture appears dystopian, yet when one looks at an infant, how can one not feel the truth of innocence and a love of the moment?

At the other end, one enters the autumn of the lifecycle. Then we are face to face with the inexorable march to mortality. How does one not become humble, wise and, similarly to the infant, live in the moment? The difference is that the elders have the ability to pass on wisdom and venerable traditions to a younger generation. In this digital age, is anybody listening? ‘

The hope, it seems to me, is with the very young and the aging to save a dying planet and revive the potential of humanity.